Ask the Narrator: Taxes for Education

"I'm sick of paying for everyone else's kids to go to school. Why can't people without children pay smaller amounts of school tax than people with children?"

Ask The Narrator

Because you’re not paying for a child to go to school. You are paying taxes in a town, and that town is funding a school for any child who lives in the district. You aren’t driving on every road the town maintains, nor using all of the services available, or even paying all that much and you may have children in that district someday.

Mostly, you are living in a civilized society and that society believes that every child deserves an education.

Some numbers. I pay about $3000 per year on my property taxes for education. I will probably pay those taxes from age 24 - 64 (after that, education taxes are minimal or zero) - so a total contribution of $120,000, which sounds like a lot but it's over 40 years. However, the town guarantees an education to any child … all of mine, any step children, foster children, grandchildren if the kids get in trouble and can’t take care of them, children of relatives if we all want them to be in a better school system, immigrant children if we decide to sponsor them, … each one costing about $15,000 per year. And that’s just my household. Homeless or orphaned, single parent or two, black or white or something in between, disabled or genius or both or neither, athlete or nerd.

My lifetime taxes pay for one child, K-9th grade. Cheap at the price.

It’s just like buying home insurance that you never used because your house never burns down ... but you bought it anyway.

Then, we have the argument that "I don't want my kids to go to public school ... why can't I spend MY money the way I want to? Gimme a full-tuition voucher to a private school."

Because it isn't your money. You don't get to contribute $3000 per year and get a check for $30,000 to send your two kids to Catholic School. And, as above, that tax money is being used by the town to provide an inexpensive education for its citizens. If you don't want to take advantage of that offer, that's fine, but you don't then get to demand they pay for your whims.

If your local school sucks, perhaps you might consider helping to change it and fix it instead of selfishly trying to destroy it with no replacement.

"What's Your Plan For Making This Happen?"

Originally published here in July 2008. Not much has changed. We're still blindly forging on.

Alexander Russo asks "What's Your Plan For Making This Happen?"

The big problem in education reform right now isn't that there aren't any good ideas out there about what to do to make things better, but that no one has any real idea how to get them moving.

I think he's got it backwards. We have plenty of people willing to "make this happen" on a small scale. That's not difficult. The problem is that no one asks whether the change SHOULD happen. We go merrily on changing things every year, instituting reforms and rejiggering the educational process constantly.

We do "academic teams," "cross-curricular work," "differentiated instruction." We do "literacy across the curriculum" but not "math or science or history or art across the curriculum". We remove art and music to prepare for tests, add art and music to make a more well-rounded individual. We drop Hamlet and MacBeth and Mythology, or we don't. We put kids into cohorts of 20 for every course of their day. We STEP them up from the course they should be in to the course we'd like them in and then we place them in remediation because they need more help.

We've tried integrated math, sequential math, Integrated algebra, SIMMS, Univ. of Chicago vs Saxon. We try changing the order of the courses from "A1, Geom, A2" to "Geom, A1,A2" or "A1,A2,Geom."

Then, there's the grading system behind the report cards. We tried to change to a 1,2,3,4 grading system with rubrics and then found out that our parents hated the idea. They didn't want lengthy rubrics full of lists of standards and individual grades, nor did they like the idea that 1 was the lowest you could get. "If he does nothing, he shouldn't get points for it! Those averages mean nothing now!"

So we changed back.  For a while.
 
We've rewritten the curriculum at least seven times in my experience and done curriculum maps in four different systems.The only thing that seems to change is the logo: now it has "Building Standards-Compliant Systems" as a tagline. (Update: Looking at this now, I notice they've updated the logo to Common Core ... awesome. That will make the maps more relevant for today's learners).

We integrate technology before most teachers have a clue what they're doing with it. We lessen the need for brains and glorify button-pushing or we improve the educational methodologies by implementing technological pedagogy to teach the 21st century student.

We changed to 4x4 block scheduling, or modified block, or traditional 40, traditional 50, or 5x60s. We have single-sex or not, We try charter schools, magnet schools, engineering only school, KIPP schools.

For what? Are we sure any of it works?

No.

Have we looked at anything before and after each "revolution" to see if anything, in fact, did change? And for the better?

No.

We change everything in education without ever examining the results of the change. The most common "evidence" I have heard as justification is "My students seem to like it better. One kid said to me just this month, 'This is cool.'"

This is the only business that uses case-control as its top sampling method, if it uses any scientific studies at all. That's nuts.

Then the anti-public school activists chime in.

"If schools were free-market, competition-based entities that had to succeed or fail based on their own merits and their effectiveness for their customers, we would quickly zero in on the most effective teaching techniques. We would stick with what is proven, and what works, because whatever doesn't work would quickly be rejected by patrons and customers -- if only choice were an option."

I've talked about "choice" before. Choice is the parents using sketchy information to make dubious choices. The only saving grace is that they are at least invested in the children they're trying to place.

If there anything that the free-market teaches us, it should be that those who are trying to make a profit will lie or stretch the truth whenever they can. When the 13 billion dollar fine for improper practices is less than 1/4th of the money the company set aside to fight the charges, you should realize that the free-market is not the friend to the consumer. As a former private school admin, I can tell you that private schools are no different from Goldman-Sachs, except in size.

Their methods are traditional, not because it's best, but because it doesn't scare away the paying customers. Decisions are made for the benefit of the school, not for the benefit of the students. (Although if the students DO benefit, they'll take every opportunity to remind everyone how wonderful they were to make those "obvious" changes and portray themselves as better than the other private schools. The opinion that public schools were cesspits filled with poor people's stupid children went unsaid, but was understood by all because "Ivy-Covered Academy" was and is a naturally superior traditional school, with traditional values.).

But we're still dancing around the real problem.

Russo goes on

Take any number of interesting proposals -- national standards, weighted student funding, differential pay, community schools, inter-district choice, universal preschool -- and what you'll see are lots of arguments and policy specifics but no real plan for getting any of these things implemented in the real world. (You know, enacted into law. Paid for.)

We're doing research without knowing what we're looking for.

What would be nice is if you could first define the goal. Then define your method of measuring that goal. Finally, see if your changes progress you towards that goal. Then you can make all the changes you want.


Until we actually do some research with appropriate statistical methods, improving education in America will remain guess- and- check.

The problem is, of course, that most of your guesses are wrong and you're not checking. Worse than that, they're not your kids.

Money isn't always the way out ...

Throwing money at the problem (like buying every kid a computer without having a clue about how to make it work) isn't the answer ... but starving the patient doesn't help the recovery.
We now take you to Bill Ferriter in South Carolina for his perspective on this.

What a waste.

Do I sound annoyed?

Yes. I have reason ... the science department has been throwing out expensive soil testing kits, tech-toys, a SmartBoard from another manufacturer, new-in-the-wrapper supplies that loser-teacher purchased and never used because he "didn't have time to figure out how to use them." Now, some years down the line, the tech has gone obsolete, or the rechargeable batteries sat for too long and now can't hold a charge, or the expensive soil testing kits were better suited for a commercial lab instead of 9th grade physical science. I left my door unlocked and said to leave me anything remotely to do with physics or math, but Loser was a biology/physical science teacher so it'll probably just be tossed..

Sorry. It just pisses me off something fierce.

Borrowing Without Collateral

The country is running up against the whole college loan things again. There's a website that claims the trillion dollars of student loan debt should all be forgiven because that'll stimulate the economy.

Intelligent people ask that those loans get deferred a couple years so that the loan payments can be made when the borrowers are a little more solvent. I'm okay with that as it acknowledges that the borrowers are accepting their debts and making the books right.

Others want all college loans wiped off the slate so that graduates can get on with their lives. WTF?

Why adults should get $100,000 loans wiped clean is beyond me. They took out loans as adults to pay for adult things and now they all get off free? What's next? Should we give them a home loan and then excuse the loan when the first few mortgage payments are due?

Which begs a question: What's the collateral in a student loan?

NYT Sob Story

Future earnings, of course.

At what point are the banks and loan-makers going to ask for that collateral? Why should a bank finance a degree in women's studies or in some other navel-gazing, narcissistic puffery which has ZERO value in the future marketplace?

I'll say it again. If you're using your own money, or you're putting up Daddy's business as collateral for this loan, then feel free to get any degree you'd like.

If your state is willing to give a free college education (not including fees), then you are free to accept the offer and take any degree the college will offer you.

If you're borrowing money with no other collateral than your future earnings, you shouldn't be surprised if the lender asks for a degree with better prospects than Burger King or trophy wife.

If you're "conned" into borrowing what you can't afford, yet you still "need" a degree in women's studies at very expensive college like NYC, don't expect much sympathy.  Pay your damn loans.

"Do you want fries with that degree?"

It's high time the federal government college loan programs start demanding valuable degrees as "collateral" for their loans.  Otherwise, taking out a loan with no thought of paying it back is fraud.

Ads on Permission Slips

Joanne Jacobs has a quick hit on selling ads on permission slips.

Ads for local businesses will appear on permission slips, class calendars and school notices sent home with elementary students in Peabody, Massachusetts, reports the Boston Globe. Ads for cigarettes and liquor will be banned.

The calendars are no big surprise. Schools have been selling ads on sports calendars for what, decades? The sports stadium is littered with ads and the cafeteria probably a bunch more. The permission slips and report cards are new, but only report cards seem to me a worthwhile location. Permission slips are sent home, quickly skimmed and signed (rarely read) and then go back to the teacher. Report cards have more permanence and might be posted somewhere and often viewed.

One of the things that amused me about the story was the idea that cigarettes and liquor ads will be banned (I guess they're too evil) but the ads targeted to elementary kids will be "age-appropriate," ... "local pizza and ice cream shops." Certain vices are verboten but it's okay to fatten them up? They're in the clear because they'll allow "dance and karate schools"? And then there's this gem of an idea ... "maybe from a florist or a college." That's funny. When I think about 3rd graders, the first thought is not usually a desire to buy from florists or a need to worry about college.

Secondly, they should be upfront and admit it's all about a little extra money the principal can waste on frivolity.

"Peabody schools laid off six teachers, two guidance counselors and other staff this year. Fees for riding the bus and playing sports were raised."

This is a drop in the bucket. Maybe enough to re-furnish the principal's office. To mention staffing numbers and fees in the same article as (wildly overestimated) $24,000 in advertising seems only calculated to reduce the inevitable backlash.

What backlash?  I'm sure that some parent will complain.  Maybe the Pizza Shack owner who has to forever display his daughter's straight-A report card with the Tony's Pizza ad on it.  I would complain if I found out that the school went through the hassle of selling the ads but had to buy specially printed report cards (using up the "profits" because every report mailing was different) and then spent hours of time trying to get the report cards to print out properly.  I would also want to earmark the money.  Putting into the Principal's Slush Fund isn't my idea of proper management.

Wait, how much?

I was struck by this when I first saw it.  Cool use of distortion effects and all that, laudable goal of getting people to slow down near schools, too. The post points out the "sweet spot" and mentions some of the unintended consequences. I get it.

But then, these two sentences jumped out at me:

The $15,000 decal was paid for by Preventable.ca ...
the decal was removed after one week. It was an experiment, a stunt,

Didn't they have a better use for $15,000 dollars that a stunt that lasted a week? And why $15,000? The local screen printer could have banged that out for a couple hundred at most. The anti-danger people can spend the money like water.

Incentives and my Degree.

Joanne Jacobs has this article on Lower pay for math, science teachers.

Math and science teachers earn less than their colleagues in 19 of 30 large districts in Washington state, reports the Center on Reinventing Public Education. That’s because salary schedules reward only longevity and graduate credits. "The analysis finds that in twenty-five of the thirty largest districts, math and science teachers had fewer years of teaching experience due to higher turnover — an indication that labor market forces do indeed vary with subject matter expertise.

She comments that "Differential pay for high-demand skills would keep more math and science teachers in the classroom."

I strongly disagree. What I see as far more likely is that those math and science teachers would get paid more,and since they don't have a clue as to the particulars of teaching, they'd leave just as quickly. Five or ten thousand bucks can't overcome that. Teaching is TOUGH -- TFAs and other dilettantes aren't going to stay no matter what.  Shoveling money into the pockets of a few teachers solely based on the course they teach is not conducive to cooperation, teacher satisfaction, morale, or the work environment as a whole. 

The fact that those with a STEM degree can and do move on to other options is unfortunate but also a good motivator. "Hey, kids! Look what applying yourself in these subjects can do for you. Mr. Smith just got a job paying  ... "

Importantly, you can never pay those folks enough to keep them in the classroom, if they are chasing the dollar. TFAs are only thinking of a two year commitment and then it's off to the "Real World" of 6-figure salaries.  No school can compete with that. $100k or more -- is this what you want to pay a teacher in their first couple of years before you even know if they can teach? (What is this, some freakin' NBA rookie deal?)

Also, remember that they were not trained to be a teacher. Teaching math and doing math are different. They were trained to build machines, or solve complex systems, or write enormous amounts of code. There's nothing there about dealing with math-phobic 15-year-olds and material you learned easily twelve years ago. My biggest difficulty in the beginning was that, by and large, few of my students was as capable as I -- I had to figure out how to reach all the kids.

I'm a math teacher with an engineering degree, but I'm okay with the salary schedule paying all teachers similarly regardless of course. English is necessary, too, you know. As is art and music and history and science and computers and languages and woodshop and tech program and forestry and, and, and. Only a few students are going to specialize in math -- one could make the argument that the other teachers are more valuable to more students. How can anyone justify paying one teacher more than another based on the job offer that someone else might have gotten?

On the other hand, refusing pay increases doesn't make for a good environment either. My principal can't even visit my classroom more than once in four years and can't understand anything I teach - how is he going to fairly set my salary? I don't work for him; I work for a vague entity called the "District." It's not his money and he has no incentive to save it. This is not the classic "Boss" everyone thinks about.

The pay needs to be enough to keep money out of the conversation. The best way to do that is with the salary schedule. Then, there's no administrative BS, favoritism, stupidity, etc. You don't get worthless teachers (albeit with shiny degree) getting 5-figure signing bonuses and still skipping out after a year or two. Fairness is an issue and the evaluation process is too unclear for people to bet thousands of dollars based on it. You also don't get people comparing notes or holding out for raises in the middle of the year.

For more on motivation, go here: Dan Pink's talk on motivation.

Of course, if you want to pay me more, I won't turn it down. It's not why I teach, though. I had many choices that paid more -- industry, entrepreneur -- but I chose teaching. I'm paid well enough, I get my vacation all at once instead of having every night and weekend free and a couple weeks in August, and I enjoy what I do when I'm teaching. For me, it's a good choice.

Sports and Pay-to-Play

Coach Brown is talking about the ACLU going after pay-to-play in schools. Snarky political commentary aside, his points are the usual ones and deserve repeating because the current climate of cost-cutting is driving schools to make some tough decisions.

First, PTP is illegal in California (specifically mentioned in law) because it prevents equal access to education. I'm not so sure equity applies here but we Americans have always had trouble with the decision of whether sports (as opposed to PE) are an integral part of school for every student or not.

BYU women's soccer team.

PTP changes the game to "support the GOOD teams." Freshmen sports will go first and then any sport whose attendance is "parents only." Football is way too important because of the "We need to beat Westside" factor and long term psychological investment of the fans in the team.

Parents and lawyers will pit girls against boys with the high-school version of the Title IX conflict. You can't cancel the 9th grade softball if you don't cancel the 9th grade baseball, even if one is undermanned and the other is full. Tournaments are out. Travel monies? Ha! (Forgetting that the travel costs are roughly the same as the cost of officials for home games - but home means you keep the gate. Decisions need to be made, but lawyers always suck cash and influence choices.

For many participants, sports provide "some of the most influential lessons they might learn in school." Very good point, bringing us back to the question of whether sports or PE is integral to education. I find that PE classes are pretty lame. Sports coaches talk about academics, morals, attitude, sportsmanship. Team building is important. PE teachers run classes that kids stand around in and tune out. 

You can make any number of correlations between the rise in importance of PE classes and the increasing emphasis on health education to the expanding waistlines of American schoolchildren, but I think there are confounding factors here. We need to overcome those confounding factors, though, and having the kids do half-assed archery, bowling, walking, pickleball, dodgeball isn't having much long-term effect.

I agree with Coach when he suggested that "physical education needs to reprioritized near the top," but I disagree that it should be "classified as an Advanced Placement style course." That's too much for PE. I can make a case (and have) for allowing a full season of a sport (including cheerleading) to count as a 1/2 PE credit. That makes sense in terms of time and effort.

That'll mean a loss of PE enrollment and at least one PE teacher would go. I'd be okay with that, but the Union wouldn't. It would also mean that the sports teams would experience a boom enrollment since most kids hate the standard pickle-ball games and would do most anything to get that PE credit playing a real sport.

That may be the real difference. The PE games and exercises are too varied and scattered and feel as if the teacher pulls something out of his butt for the day. No one has a chance to get truly good at anything and you have the ultimate in heterogeneous grouping. Sports, on the other hand, are "tracked." Contrary to most educational current demagoguery, students like homogeneous grouping and thrive in it.

Besides, coaches are cheaper than teachers. If it's just about the money, of course.

School Spending

Here's a nice little "exposé" from the CATO Institute about school spending and how they hide their "true" expenses from the public.

While I agree that all expenses should be published, I don't think that all should be lumped into the per-pupil numbers in the way suggested. I think it's perfectly appropriate to have them separated.

Should everything be clear? Yes. Should everything be understandable by the average taxpayer? No, because the average taxpayer doesn't know jump about financing and accounting. The ones who do know something about it (not pros mind you but knowledgeable) should be able to figure things out on their own and the information should be available.

The comparison to private school tuition is an interesting slight-of-hand and is the real reason I picked up on this. He says something like "private schools tell you what it costs to educate your kid," which is true to a point. Private schools DO tell you the tuition. They do not tell you what it actually costs, though. That's a key point because he is complaining about how the Public schools left out information. He forgot to mention that the Private schools left out the same information.

I'm always amused by the claim that the local Catholic School is "so inexpensive." Yeah, because they don't own or maintain a building. The Diocese does, and the School rents it for a dollar a year. Likewise, many of the usual "costs" are off the budget. Of course, it always helps if you have nuns teaching - they are incredibly good but historically have been paid next to nothing. And, it this case, many are on the Diocese payroll. Presto, "lower cost per student."

Most private schools are 501c(3), non-profit organizations which means that people can donate to them and write it off their taxes. That's money that isn't charged to the parents. Private schools also don't have a capital bond. They have a capital fund drive instead. Nearly every building on a private school campus has someone's name on it - the name of the person who gave the money to build it.

(It's funny. Public schools name things after a late teacher or principal who made a huge impact on the school. Private schools name things after the person who donated money for it.)

The Alumni Director is an important and well-paid position because the alumni give big bucks. There is a Development Director whose sole job is begging for money. There are dozens of fund-raising situations every year at every school. Parents in another local academy are required to help in the fundraisers.

Then the bookkeepers rise up. In a private school, fees are the thing. The parents pay for all sorts of things. Books are obvious. But also, most field trips and activities are extra. Don't for get the lab fee and the materials fee and the art materials fees. If it costs the school, it gets passed on to the parents. I know. I ran a school for years.

That's the big difference between public and private and is always ignored when people tout the relatively low cost of private schools.

But then, who expects politics and money to be anything but contentious?

Refinance

Peoples.com offered a refinance for 3.875% (w/ 2pts) on a 20 year loan. Now would be a good time for everyone to jump on this bandwagon. Wells Fargo was almost as good. Do it, if you can. Rates are down across the board. You'll save a holy pantload either in overall interest or in monthly payments. At least think about it?
Save one of these:

Or a million of these:

Or half as many of these:

But don't even think about these.

They're not even worth the paper they're printed on.

Saving money, still buying pencils.

Ricochet copied a rant. I commented but figured I'd repeat two things here just to spread good things around.

Cheap, too.
IF you play it right.

Staples has 1 cent offers in the weekly flyer this time of year. Usually, they are 2 per customer, but teachers can get 25 with some school ID. Got that?  Nobody mentions it in the store -- you have to ask and then they're all smiles.  So, MENTION IT!

Pencils were 8/pack so 200 pencils cost 25 cents.  And I went back the next day (It's near the post office).  and the next day. and whenever I drive by on some other errand .... like Stop & Shop next door. Did I mention that my wife who teaches elsewhere comes in at the same time?  1 cent for 2-pocket portfolio. BAM! 25 cents, 25 folders 1 class done. Paper and Single-subject notebooks are 25 cents. No limit. You should see my hall closet ... $10 buys a hell of a lot of stuff at these rates.

As for books, we FINALLY got the business office to realize the benefits of a credit card for Amazon.  If you can, schmooze the people who do the work up there and show them how much can be saved when you order through Amazon and Amazaon Used&New for your textbooks and such.  It made a big difference for us when we showed them how much we saved.

You can thank me later.

Placing the Blame - Student Debt.

The NYTimes has a long article detailing the money troubles of a recent grad with thousands in debt. Showing pictures of her in her fashionable clothes and a ten-speed bike, the reporter bemoans the seemingly vast numbers of students who, through no fault of their own, racked up enormous debt. The colleges and universities should do something, he rants. Deputize MBA students (?). The parents - are they at fault? Sallie Mae? CitiBank?  Yeah, CitiBank.

Puhlease. Just because she's pretty doesn't mean she's right. Just because CitiBank sucks doesn't mean they're wrong. Let's examine a few things.

"The balance on Cortney Munna’s loans is about $97,000, including all of her federal loans and her private debt from Sallie Mae and Citibank. What are her options for digging out?"

Holy crap. She must have really needed that degree if she was willing to incur that much debt. The prospects must have been good before the recession hit, wouldn't you think? I'll bet this was an MBA or engineering degree? She's got savant talent and is about to blow your doors off? Well, no.

"... since graduating with an interdisciplinary degree in religious and women’s studies."

Right there, you can tell this isn't going to end well. This is obviously not a financial wizard. She majored in touchy-feely on someone else's nickel. She went to NYU instead of CC or any of the SUNY campuses. It isn't all bad, though. She just got a raise. Now she makes almost as much as I do.

"She recently received a raise and now makes $22 an hour working for a photographer. After taxes, she takes home about $2,300 a month. Rent runs $750, and the full monthly payments on her student loans would be about $700 if they weren’t being deferred, which would not leave a lot left over."

Not a lot left? That would be $850 per month left over, maybe $30 per day. She is just out of college. She can brown-bag lunches like the rest of us. Share expenses. Skip the "going out" stuff. Bike to work instead of bus or car. Share the apartment. Get a second job, if she needs the money so badly. Get another, more useful college degree but not if it is solely to avoid paying your debt. When you are desperate, try 80-hour work weeks - it beats eight hours of tv and partying every night.

Another womyn's studies disaster. Cry me a river.

The article is copied below.

Credit Scores and Correlations, with a little Politics

Yahoo News has a story about loans and credit scores. It starts with the typical hook of misstating the case and then appeal to pity:

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Some homeowners who sign up for the government's mortgage assistance program are getting a nasty surprise: Lower credit scores. For borrowers who are making their payments on time but are on the verge of default, the Obama administration's loan modification program can reduce their credit score as much as 100 points. That makes it harder to get a loan and can present a problem when applying for a new job. Housing counselors say it's unfair, especially because the news often comes as a surprise to homeowners.

Doesn't anyone notice that the whole idea of credit score is Character, Capital, Capacity? If you need the credit modification, you are implying that you are having trouble paying off your current obligations. If so, why would you expect that your credit score wouldn't reflect that? If your capacity isn't up to your current loans, why is anyone surprised that the credit rating drops to reflect that and make it harder for you to borrow even more?

Here's the "correlation does not imply causation" part:

"Why should people's credit be hurt even worse when they're trying to do the right thing?" said Eileen Anderson,

And many homeowners are angry that a program designed to help carries such a penalty, said Kathy Conley. "It's a feeling of being duped,"

Interesting how the President's program is blamed for the drop, not the credit agencies who change the score or the homeowner whose financial situation does not warrant a high credit rating.

Dude wanted a car.

"[he] had to apply for the loan. He was shocked to learn that, after signing up for the Obama plan, he was denied. "I should have been told," that this might happen, Owens said. "Without credit, you can't do a whole lot in life."

Dude is a moron.

Because the NFL is against selling a product ...

A player struck the Captain Morgan pose in the Eagles game. The NFL fined him because they didn't get a cut ...

The NFL will likely be a little more sensitive with this latest promotion, since it would have benefited Gridiron Greats, and the post-career struggles of players has been a paramount hot-button topic. While the league welcomes charitable donations to Gridiron Greats, it doesn’t want those contributions to be used as a carrot to influence the on-field antics of players – particularly when the antics center on selling a product.

God knows, you wouldn't want crass commercialism to get in the way of a football game, would you?

I think it was hilarious. The players should pose anyway and Captain Morgan should pay the fine AND pay the $50,000 to the retired players fund.

Gee, is American Thinker Conservative?

Read this American Thinker article on paying students to work and go to school.

Here's my response, lost amoung all of the ditto-heads who are condemning these kids as shameful losers:

This sounds fishy to me. The writer can't write clean, grammatically correct sentences - this is a teacher? I'd have to see corroboration before I believe it.

It reads like he is mentioning only the extreme cases that feed his own pretentious ego. "Look at all those losers. I, the great and mighty know-it-all white boy, would never do something so stupid."

Dude. The first time ANY kid gets $600, they're going to blow it on stupid things, and any group of kids will have some with alcohol and drug problems. If the deal is made - do this and we'll pay you - then the "teacher" should get off his high moral ground and let them make mistakes and learn from them. If he can't do that, he shouldn't be in that position.

Also, they were scheduled to clean for five hours and school for three. How about we find out whether they worked well for that time and earned the right to "waste" their money? You know, by buying a computer and wasting all their time reading American Thinker and making snarky comments.

Money isn't everything.

I keep hearing the same refrain: "Why should we keep funding schools? My tax money would be better spent elsewhere. Why should the schools keep getting 3% - 6% increases when I didn't get that this year?" and so on.

Money isn't everything, but not much gets done in this country without it.

If you've been funding your school properly for the last ten years, then you can easily keep the increases to the rate of inflation. Massive increases are unnecessary. Spending cuts will be possible but only for the "spend to the limits of your budget" kinds of purchases. Overall, the budget won't decrease unless you cut Art or do something equally foolish.

If you've been scrimping and underpaying for years, then more money will become necessary. Sooner or later, you'll have to repair, hire, replace, install or upgrade from the twenty-year-old books to something with covers and mentions of post-cold war America. Spending cuts will only make problems worse.

Enough Said

From Dave Marain at Math Notations comes word of this CNN Money article:

Most lucrative college degrees

By Julianne Pepitone, CNNMoney.com contributing writer
July 24, 2009: 04:39 AM EDT

Math majors don't always get much respect on college campuses, but fat post-grad wallets should be enough to give them a boost.

The top 15 highest-earning college degrees all have one thing in common -- math skills. That's according to a recent survey from the National Association of Colleges and Employers, which tracks college graduates' job offers.

"Math is at the crux of who gets paid," said Ed Koc, director of research at NACE. "If you have those skills, you are an extremely valuable asset. We don't generate enough people like that in this country."

This year Rochester Institute of Technology hosted recruiters from defense-industry firms like Lockheed Martin and Northrop Grumman, as well as other big companies like Microsoft and Johnson & Johnson.

"The tech fields are what's driving salaries and offers, and the top students are faring quite well," said Emanuel Contomanolis, who runs RIT's career center.

Specifically, engineering diplomas account for 12 of the 15 the top-paying majors. NACE collects its data by surveying 200 college career centers.

Energy is the key. Petroleum engineering was by far highest-paying degree, with an average starting offer of $83,121, thanks to that resource's growing scarcity. Graduates with these degrees generally find work locating oil and gas reservoirs, or in developing ways to bring those resources to the Earth's surface.

"Exploration for new energy sources is high," Koc said. "The oil and gas industry has done relatively well the past year, even though oil prices are off right now."

Other highly-paid engineering majors include chemical engineers, who employ their skills to make everything from plastics to fuel cells and have an average starting offer of $64,902.

Mining engineers start at $64,404 on average, while computer engineers, who have an expertise in both coding and electrical engineering, pocket roughly $61,738 their first year out of school.

Left behind. Of course, not every student with an engineering degree will score a fat paycheck. RIT's Contomanolis noted that "average" graduates are feeling the pinch of fewer job offers. Still, in a tough job market, graduates with technology degrees have an advantage.

"It's a tech-driven world, and demand [for engineers] is only going to grow," said Farnoosh Torabi, employment expert and Quicken blog editor. "You can't say that about many fields, especially in a recession."

Perhaps that's why more and more college students are picking their majors based on a field's earning power, ultimately "choosing a major that pays," Torabi said.

Top non-engineering fields. Only three of the 15 top paying degrees were outside the field of engineering -- but they each still require math skills.

For computer science majors, who specialize in programming and software, the average salary was $61,407. Graduates with degrees in actuarial science took home about $56,320; and jobs for students in construction management paid about $53,199. Each of these fields has paid well throughout the years, Koc said.

What happened to well-rounded? There are far fewer people graduating with math-based majors, compared to their liberal-arts counterparts, which is why they are paid at such a premium. The fields of engineering and computer science each make up about 4% of all college graduates, while social science and history each comprise 16%, Koc noted.

As a result, salaries for graduates who studied fields like social work command tiny paychecks, somewhere in the vicinity of $29,000. English, foreign language and communications majors make about $35,000, Koc said.

"It's a supply and demand issue," he added. "So few grads offer math skills, and those who can are rewarded."

Volunteering for Money

The Daily Gazette has an Editorial: Tax breaks for volunteer firemen

"Sen. Charles Schumer ... give volunteer firefighters and emergency medical technicians a $1,000 federal income tax credit ... a state bill to provide property tax breaks for volunteers ... aren’t volunteering ... like they used to. They’re either too busy with their jobs or families, too lazy, too selfish — there are any number of reasons."

Here's the clicher: Schumer wants to give "anyone who spends at least six months as a volunteer and at least 40 hours per year working in that capacity $1,000 off their federal tax bill"

When you put it like that, people will start to calculate the hourly rates and your volunteers will fall even more. Besides, people who volunteer for financial gain tend to be lousy volunteers and far more of a pain in the ass than anything else.

I can see many people starting this process, entering training (at huge cost to the system), hanging around being a pain and wasting the time of the real volunteers and firemen. I can see the Captains in a paperwork nightmare, having to sign off that each man and woman was indeed there for 40 working hours and 6 volunteering months each year. I can see many people showing up, waving and going to their real jobs. I can see resentment forming that "They're only doing it for the G" and "Him? He was here 40 hours?"

"If you do for the reward and recognition, you can't afford it. If you do it for the enjoyment, the reward and recognition comes free of charge."

A Fine Whine of the Upper Class

I had to laugh at this Wall Street Journal Article on those "middle-class" folks who "only" make $250,000 a year.

"I'm not complaining, but the reality is ... " yes, you are complaining.  Unnecessarily so.  You have a 2500 sq.ft. house in the burbs, drive an infiniti and whine about how plebian you are.  Tough noogies, woman.

The article helpfully explains their plight, "They are by no means struggling, compared with the 98% of Americans who make far less, but depending on where they live and the lifestyle choices they have made, they don't necessarily feel rich, either."

So?

If you think $250k per isn't enough, then what exactly WOULD be enough for you?  How much food do we have to shove into your mouth to satisfy you?  How many cars do you need?  How much couch space is sufficient for you? 

How arrogant can you get?